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- !SOURCE: Email from N. Combs to Weldon Whipple, 28 Jul 2004. Cites The Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans: Volume IX
SPENCE, Robert Traill {25009}, naval officer, was born in Portsmouth, N.H., in 1785; son of Keith Spence {24987} of Kirkwall, Orkney Islands, who settled in Portsmouth as a merchant, and afterward became purser of the U.S. frigate Philadelphia, and married Mary{24986}, only daughter of Robert and Mary (Whipple) Traill. Robert T. Spence was warranted a midshipman in 1800, and served under Decatur in the Tripolitan war, being on gun-boat Number 8 when she was destroyed Aug. 7, 1804. He was commissioned lieutenant in 1807, and served under Commodore Rogers in the war of 1812, being promoted master-commandant in 1813, and past-captain, 1815. When stationed in the West Indies in 1892, he vigorously defended the jeopardized rights of Americans, and in 1826 was given command of the West India fleet, but died before leaving port. He was married to Mary Clare {38603}, daughter of Nicholas MacCubben and Anne (Jennings) Carroll, of Annapolis, Md., and had several children, including: Carroll Spence; Charles Lowell Stuart Spence; Robert Traill Spence, M.D., and Stephen Decatur Spence. His sister, Harriet Brackett Spence, married the Rev. Charles Lowell, D.D., and became the mother of James Russell Lowell. Capt. Robert T. Spence died near Baltmore, Md., Sept. 26, 1827.
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d. 26 Sep 1827, near, Baltimore, Baltimore, Maryland